


Early Crimes Call for Early Punishment

by TheOceanIsMyInkwell



Category: What We Do in the Shadows (TV)
Genre: Banter, Bullying, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Cute Kids, Fluff, Gen, Guillermo is sick and tired of Nandor's bs, Humor, Idiots in Love, Nandor has feelings, Nandor wants to be a dad, Pining, shocker I know
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-01-27
Packaged: 2021-03-12 20:15:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29016441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheOceanIsMyInkwell/pseuds/TheOceanIsMyInkwell
Summary: “These bullies,” says Nandor matter-of-factly. “Have you killed them?”“No,” says Guillermo, mirth fading rapidly from his eyes.Nandor peels himself from the lintel and makes his way toward the front door. “Then point the way and I will do the deed.”“Nandor,” says Guillermo, the picture of eleven-year-old exasperation, “they’re twelve years old.”Nandor bares his teeth. “Early crimes call for early punishment.”“Dios mío,” Guillermo says dryly. “Can you chill for a second?"--Or: Guillermo brings home a frightened little kid, and Nandor's paternal instincts are going slightly feral. Cue him fantasizing about being a human again so he can have a family with his beloved familiar.
Relationships: Guillermo de la Cruz & Nandor the Relentless, Guillermo de la Cruz/Nandor the Relentless
Comments: 16
Kudos: 48





	Early Crimes Call for Early Punishment

**Author's Note:**

> Allll my love goes to C, Chels, and Kai for obliging my demands for three random drabble prompts so I could put them together into one semi-coherent plotline. Here they are:
> 
> 2: “Hey, hey, calm down. They can’t hurt you anymore.”
> 
> 20: “I don’t want to hear your excuse. You can’t just give me wet-willies.”
> 
> 99: “How could you forget your son’s birthday?”
> 
> Warning for implied encounter with child bullies. Other than that, this is pretty much straight up crack! Enjoy!!

The first time Nandor sees Guillermo with a child, it is completely by accident and per usual filled with unintentional mishaps, murderous rages and gross misunderstandings. But that’s just par for the course with his never-ending existence among idiots on the mortal plane, Nandor thinks practically. What’s more notable about the incident is that it’s the first time he actually considers...the joys of being human.

Despicable, yes, he’s well aware, but most of his sanity hurtled straight out the window the moment his heart decided to fall in love with his familiar of its own volition, anyway.

(Begone, thought, is the next thing Nandor hisses at himself. Love! Bah!)

It’s a Tuesday evening and Nandor is doing his best not to be cross, but it’s already half past eight and he’s had to stumble out of his coffin all by himself. He tried calling for Guillermo several times--both through the coffin lid and through the ether--but to no avail. The adorable and ever irritating little human is nowhere to be found. Now Nandor is standing half-naked in the middle of his crypt, faced with the appalling dilemma of either calling out to his housemates to help him search for the familiar whom they always did say was too familiar, or deigning to dress himself like an actual cave pig.

Well, he’s Nandor the Relentless and it is Guillermo the Eternally Vexing involved, so dress himself like an actual cave pig it is.

He slips on his boots and stomps down the hallway to the foyer where he can peep from side to side to check if Guillermo could be hiding in the library or the fancy room. “Guillermo!” he hisses, just for good measure.

He wonders briefly if the familiar could be on the second floor. He promptly decides that no, if Guillermo were up there, he’d be able to hear the human’s heart beating a tad faster than usual because Guillermo’s heart rate picks up after each time he takes the stairs.

Fragile, stupidly endearing human.

Nandor flings open the front door and stalks down the pathway, calling his familiar’s name again. Maybe he’s out back burying bodies? Nandor can’t recall if Nadja and Laszlo recently caught any humans of their own that might need to be disposed of. He certainly hasn’t had any recently that could be stolen by the covetous couple from his cells.

A quick peek round the backyard tells him that Guillermo is not to be found there, either. He bares his teeth and turns swiftly on his heel to head back to the front door--no plan in mind, really, except to stew until the guy decides to finally show up to his fucking _job_ \--when suddenly his supernatural hearing catches the drift of a strange and rather one-sided conversation.

“I’m here, okay? No need to panic. I think they’re gone. Just take some deep breaths. Can you do that for me?”

A sniffle and something like a hiccup, and then Guillermo’s voice continues its soothing little reassurances.

Brow furrowed, Nandor weaves his way through Laszlo’s topiaries and approaches the hedge at the southwest corner of the house. He doesn’t see anything at first, despite Guillermo’s voice growing louder as he draws nearer. Then he casts his gaze downward, and sure enough, there his familiar is, down on one knee on the grubby dry-leafed sidewalk, hands out to rub up and down the spindly arms of a child.

Nandor’s had children before, yes, but seven hundred and something-odd years living as an unwilling and petulant immortal no longer feared by the general public has really waned his interest in and memory of basic child stages. So suffice it to say he’s pretty damn confused when he sees his familiar on his knees comforting what seems to him to be the equivalent of a wailing infant.

“Guillermo?” he demands.

Both the familiar and the child whip their heads in his direction, finding him looming over them from above the top of the hedge.

“Oh. Hey there, master. I got a little, uh--tied up here.”

The kid is still staring at Nandor, who attempts a smile and a wiggly-fingered wave. Instead of being reassured, the kid lets out a little gasp and starts hyperventilating all over again.

“Hey, hey, calm down. Calm down,” Guillermo says to him, squeezing the little boy’s shoulders more firmly. “Hey. I’m here. They can’t hurt you anymore.” Guillermo glances up at his master, and realization dawns on him. “Oh, he’s harmless. Just my boss. He’s trying to be friendly.”

To his credit, the kid does attempt a brave nod around his snot and tears. He pitches forward, and Guillermo catches him without hesitation, letting the tyke bury his dripping nose in the shoulder of Guillermo’s favorite autumn jacket and release a series of impressive hiccups.

“Can you breathe?”

When the boy doesn’t answer for a long minute, Guillermo pulls away gently and cups the kid’s face to have a better look at him. “Can you breathe for me?” he asks the kid again.

The boy nods, and his chest spasms as he does so, but he draws deep, wheezing breaths to calm him down.

“Can you talk?”

“A little,” the boy speaks for the first time.

“Okay. That’s good. We’re gonna go inside the house for a little bit, okay? Just to get you some water and let you sit somewhere warm.” Guillermo stands, holding out his hand slowly and clearly for the kid to take, and the boy obliges and slips his palm into the man’s.

“Guillermo!” Nandor calls over the hedge, for the first time reacting to this bizarre event. “Why are you bringing your little human into the house? Why do you even _have_ a little human?”

Guillermo puts up a finger in Nandor’s direction like _hold that thought_ \--the _nerve_ on this familiar!--and continues ushering the boy up the pathway and the stairs to the front door until they’re in the foyer. Only then does Guillermo hang back a bit to hold the door open for his master.

Nandor joins them wordlessly, but the unspoken exclamation points and question marks and colorful insults in his head are more than readable to Guillermo.

When Guillermo has fetched a glass of cool water and pressed it into the boy’s hand, he finally turns to address Nandor. “Yes?”

Nandor doesn’t even know where to begin. The mud tracks? The late arrival? The fact that he is still only half-decent in his unbuttoned shirt and trousers because he couldn’t buckle his vest and cape?

He decides that’s as good a place as any to start. “Look at me, Guillermo,” he growls. “I’m only half-decent! I could not buckle the stupid vest and cape because you were not there!”

“I’m sorry, but Diego needed help,” Guillermo says simply.

Nandor glances back down at the kid chugging water. Diego. He grimaces at the tiny human, so frail-looking and with such large, annoyingly expressive eyes.

“Thank you,” the kid pipes up then.

Guillermo’s entire demeanor transforms at the rasp of the boy’s voice. He turns, shoulders softening, back bending easily, and warmth and affection flood his voice and tone as he takes the empty glass from Diego’s hand and lays a fatherly palm on top of his messy curls.

Fatherly--

Son of a _bitch_.

Without warning, Nandor seizes Guillermo by the bicep and yanks him into the fancy room, slamming the door shut behind them.

“Nandor!” Guillermo reproaches him, and wriggles right out of Nandor’s grasp to yank the door open.

Nandor yanks him back and kicks the door closed again. On the other side, little Diego seems more confused than frightened.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Guillermo whisper-yells. “I can’t just leave him there in the foyer! What if Nadja or Laszlo find him?”

“How dare you, Guillermo! We are not infant-killers!” Nandor seethes, all up in his face. He stops and considers a minute. “Well, Laszlo did turn that infant once but...he was bored! He’s a changed man now and that’s a very ignorant thing to say!”

Guillermo rolls his eyes. “I don’t have time for this. I’m going back out there to talk to Diego and you can’t stop me.”

“It is very unprofessional of you to bring your son home, Guillermo! And it is--no, we have an even bigger problem. It is very unprofessional of you to have a son. What were you thinking? Why were you never telling me these things?”

Guillermo’s eyes widen more and more as Nandor’s tirade continues, and then his eyes snap upward in epiphany. “Oh my Go--master. He’s not my--”

“I am very hurt, you know. But it is not my feelings that are worrying me. How can you be a good familiar if you are having to run around after your tiny human, picking him up after he falls down and scrapes his knees, and giving him your shoulder to cry boogers on, when I am here calling for you like _Guillermo, Guillermo_!” Nandor adjusts his voice to a whisper-holler to vividly illustrate his aforementioned calls to his familiar on the mortal and ether plane. “I am very hungry, and tired, and I had such a terrible dream last night about you leaving, which makes me think that Stephanie the witch was onto something when she said I had the power of sight because look at you--running off without my permission and having little humans and spending your time taking care of them over me…”

Guillermo crosses his arms and waits. When Nandor trails off, his familiar raises a brow at him. “Are you done yet?”

Nandor deflates. “More or less.”

“Diego is not my kid,” Guillermo says flatly. “He’s abuelita’s cousin’s grandson’s friend and I was babysitting him this afternoon.”

Nandor’s face screws up just trying to follow the trail of blood relation between Guillermo and the tiny shivering human on the other side of the door.

“Also, he ran off earlier today and I only just found him, and a bunch of assholes got to him first and roughed him up. So please, _please_ will you open the door and let me talk to him?”

Well, now Nandor feels rather stupid.

(It’s not a feeling he often gets, much less entertains. He decides he rather despises it.)

“Begone,” he says with a sniff and a dismissive wave of his hand at the door. “But we are not finished yet, Guillermo. I raised some very valid points that you have not answered yet.”

“Yes, master,” Guillermo says with his back to Nandor and his hand already on the knob. The eyeroll is more than audible in his tone.

Once Guillermo has rejoined Diego in the foyer, Nandor hangs back a bit with his face pressed partially through the crack in the doorway. His initial displeasure at his own idiocy has rapidly dissipated and given way to curiosity. He doesn’t think he’s ever witnessed Guillermo being this gentle before--barring, of course, the samoyed incident and the chihuahua incident and the...whole lot of pet-related incidents.

“I just called your mama and she’s coming in a few minutes to pick you up, okay?”

“Thank you,” says Diego.

“Hey. It’s no problem. Just don’t go running off again like that in the future, all right? It’s easier for me to keep an eye on you when I know where you are.”

Diego mumbles something that’s too low even for Nandor to catch entirely.

Guillermo sighs. “I know. You did nothing wrong, Diego. _Nothing_ , you hear me? They’re the assholes. Don’t tell mama I said that. But they had no right to push you around.”

At Diego’s next murmured response, Guillermo stiffens. “I don’t care what they think they can call you. They’re bullies and they tried to hurt you because they thought you were alone. You’re not alone. I won’t let that happen to you again, I _swear_.”

Diego flings himself into Guillermo’s arms again, this time catching the man by surprise. He rocks back on his heels a bit with a small _oof_. It’s a picture of awkward tenderness, one that even Nandor isn’t loathe to admit is a tad touching.

Yeesh. Eight centuries as a vampire and you get bored enough with ravaging and pillaging and conquering Ashley Street that you start to find the travails of little humans touching.

And then the next moment, Guillermo is gasping and shrieking. “Diego. Diego! Sto-ho-ho-hop!”

He spins the kid around, almost dropping him out of reflex. Diego lets out endless peals of laughter.

Guillermo pretends to set him down and glare at him. “Listen. I don’t care what your excuse is. You can _not_ just give me wet-willies.”

Nandor is once again confused by the entire situation because he does not know what was wet about what just happened nor what anything has to do with willies. He’s had his head fully leaning out between the door and the lintel for the past few minutes now to pick up the rest of the conversation, and he figures now is a good time to butt in and...figure out what the fuck is going on. He sticks the rest of his body out the doorway of the fancy room. Diego senses the movement and looks up, straight at him. Guillermo follows his gaze and makes flinching eye contact with his master.

“These bullies,” says Nandor matter-of-factly. “Have you killed them?”

“No,” says Guillermo, mirth fading rapidly from his eyes.

Nandor peels himself from the lintel and makes his way toward the front door. “Then point the way and I will do the deed.”

“Nandor,” says Guillermo, the picture of eleven-year-old exasperation, “they’re twelve years old.”

Nandor bares his teeth. “Early crimes call for early punishment.”

“Dios mío,” Guillermo says dryly. “Can you chill for a second? Diego’s mom will be here soon and you can’t talk about...you know…” He makes a slicing motion over his neck. “In front of her.”

Right on cue, the sound of tires on gravel interrupts them both. Diego’s mom, who introduces herself in a flurry as Alejandra, barely batting an eye at Nandor’s clearly period-themed and poorly put-together attire, scoops up Diego in her arms and peppers his sweaty cheeks with kisses of pure relief.

“Thank you so much,” she breathes in Guillermo’s direction. “Really. I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t found him.”

Guillermo presses his lips together bashfully. “It’s okay, Tía. Really. I just hope Diego will be okay.”

In reply, the kid grins for the first time, boasting his four pearly front teeth that have just come in.

Guillermo swoops forward to drop a generous round of kisses on top of Diego’s head, too. “Take care, mijo. Remember I’m always around if you need me, okay?”

Diego nods and buries his face back in his mom’s shoulders.

Alejandra and Guillermo exchange their pleasantries, and then as she makes her way down the steps she exclaims, “Oh! Don’t forget, his birthday party is tomorrow! We’re all really hoping to see you there, Memo! You haven’t been around for _ages_.”

The smile freezes on Guillermo’s face into a frown as the full implication of Alejandra’s invitation hits him. He lifts a wooden hand in a wave. “Yeahhh,” he laughs awkwardly. “Yeah, I totally have it down on my calendar! Wouldn’t--wouldn’t miss it for the world…”

The door shuts and Alejandra loads herself and her son into the car, and Guillermo spins around to press his back against the front door with a look of sheer panic.

“I do _not_ have it down on my calendar,” he moans.

Nandor tuts at him, all sass and teasing now. “ _Guillermo_. How could you forget your son’s birthday?”

Guillermo groans at him. “He is _not_ my son.”

“Oh-ho! Is that why you are letting him be giving you the wet-willies?”

Guillermo rolls him a droll look. “I’m pretty sure you don’t even know what wet-willies are, Nandor.”

“Of course I do!” Nandor scoffs, and then flounders. “They are--they are like kisses, but for small humans when they are in need of comforting.”

“Sure,” says Guillermo. “That’s it.”

Nandor casts him a smug look, any hint of subtlety or sarcasm completely lost to him. Oh, to exist in the bliss of the uncomplicated mind of Nandor the Relentless.

“Sooo,” says his familiar. “About tomorrow...is there any chance I can get my Saturday off tomorrow?”

Nandor stares at him. “But tomorrow is a Wendy’s-day.”

Guillermo scratches the back of his neck. “I know, but--I totally did forget about Diego’s birthday and I feel like I kind of owe it to Tía Alejandra to show up there, now that I’ve...kind of partially endangered her only son by letting him wander off down Main Street when we were supposed to be going to the park? So I need to have the day off to get up early and find a present for him, and some presents for Tía and Tío and those other two people that live with them...not sure if they’re cousins or something…”

Nandor’s stance relaxes and he cocks his head unconsciously at his familiar’s characteristic rambling. Of course he’ll let Guillermo have his day off. He may be relentless, yes, but he is not heartless, thank you very much. After seeing what Guillermo and his little human-for-the-day have been through, he thinks he’s being more than fair as a master to allow his familiar this brief apologetic excursion tomorrow.

“Wait here,” he says.

Guillermo’s mouth opens and closes like a fish as Nandor whisks down the hall toward his crypt and then whizzes back. In his hands he has a small stuffed...beluga whale?

“Give this to Diego,” Nandor says imperiously. “And tell him it was from the kind man who offered to slit the throats of his oppressors for him.”

Guillermo takes the beluga plushie with the reluctant awe of someone who is seeing his master in a new light. “Right. Okay. Probably not the last bit you just said, but...thank you.” And then he’s blinking, too rapidly to be normal, and he’s clearing his throat and pushing his glasses up his nose by the bridge with a finger like he always does when he’s overwhelmed.

“Now.” Nandor beckons with his head. “Attend to me, Guillermo. I cannot be spending the rest of the evening standing around like this almost naked while little ones come in and out of this house.”

“Yes, master,” says Guillermo, trailing after him, and his tone just about says it all.

Hours later, after Guillermo has silently helped his master unbutton and then rebutton his disaster of an outfit and clasp his everyday lounging cape around his shoulders, and tidied up as normal around Nandor’s crypt, the two of them find themselves at their usual chess table by the bay window trading their signature moves while the shadows of Laszlo and Nadja having a rousing argument in the garden entertain them from the corners of their eyes.

“Guillermo,” Nandor breaks the silence at last. “You are being very quiet.”

“Just thinking of Diego,” Guillermo admits. “I was...I was really scared for him, master.”

Nandor hums. He’s unsure how much of his current thought process to share with his familiar. “You are very good with him,” he decides to say primly.

“Oh. Oh, thank you, master. I guess I’ve…” Guillermo shrugs with what is possibly the beginnings of a blush. “I’ve always liked kids.”

So has Nandor. He hopes Guillermo doesn’t know this--it would be oh, so embarrassing for him--but he’s always wondered if he has any other surviving descendants in the world aside from the one he regretfully and far too enthusiastically frightened to death.

If there is anything about his immortality that chafes at Nandor the most, it is quite possibly the loss of his ability to be a father. Sure, he could have descendants, he thinks, but with the whole undying and blood-drinking deal...very inconvenient. 

And for the briefest of moments, a vision flashes across Nandor’s mind: a vision of him and Guillermo, lovers, _humans_ , holding a pair of little ones in their arms and Nandor bouncing one of them up and down in the air while his Guillermo looks at him with fond exasperation and loses himself to an unwilling laugh.

He would be human for that, Nandor realizes. He would...he would be human for Guillermo and for the chance to have children together.

Chest now laced with panic, Nandor clears his throat ostentatiously. “Yes, well, little humans...they are always running about and needing the hugs and kisses and the protecting from the twelve-year-old bullies.”

Something in the way Guillermo’s looking at him shifts infinitesimally. He’s melting.

“You know,” he says, lightly now, teasing, “it was pretty hilarious how you thought Diego was my kid.”

Nandor does _not_ appreciate that lilt in Guillermo’s tone. “Yes, well, you are very soft, Guillermo, even for a human. You looked like you were about to cry over this little child. It was only a normal assumption to make!”

“Master,” Guillermo says, and oh, geez, he’s definitely got something devilish up his sleeve.

“ _What_ , Guillermo.”

“You know I couldn’t possibly be a father because I’m still a virgin, right?”

Oh, fuck _off_ , Guillermo de la Cruz, Nandor thinks. And he decides to tell him as such.

**Author's Note:**

> This was such a fun exercise and I love mashing together prompts that don't seem like they would fit but actually do >:) Blease if you see anything in [this list](https://theoceanismyinkwell.tumblr.com/post/637081124459462657/drabble-challenge) that you want me to write, comment them below or dm me on tumblr and i'll get right on it!!
> 
> Anywho what was your favorite part? Which Nandor moment did you facepalm at? Holler at me in the comments if you will! Ily and thank you for reading <3 -kaleb
> 
> my socials:  
> tumblr: theoceanismyinkwell  
> insta: kc.barrie  
> wattpad: kalebbarrie


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